Ouroboros
by Rosario545675
Summary: The First time Link fights Ganon, he dies.


The first time Link confronts Ganon, he dies.

He's high off the rush of power that comes with the master sword, magic and adrenaline burning side-by-side through his veins.

He feels powerful. He feels like he can move mountains, like he can stop the flow of time.

Like he can take on Ganon and win.

He will free Zelda, he will free Hyrule. (And maybe, if he's lucky, he'll be able to free himself)

So when he strides into the castle, his steps ring heavy with self assurance. He doesn't challenge the lionels, he avoids the guardians, because what do they matter? They'll disappear when Ganon is gone.

(They have to, right?)

But when he reaches the atrium, after hours of sneaking through the familiar-but-not halls, camping, barely sleeping, in isolated corners and long-forgotten rooms, he stops dead in his tracks, door swinging on its hinges-because this can't be.

The inner sanctum is empty.

It's the most pristine room in the castle. Not a whiff of malice, not a hint of something evil or of or wrong. The air is muted, and not even the whistling of wind through the parapets can be heard. Even time itself seems to have left this place untouched, banners still a deep red, statues left unbroken. Even the triforce emblem behind the throne remains intact, gleaming gold in it's eerily flawless beauty.

Still, there's something uneasy about it- something about the sound, the wholeness, the lack of dust motes floating through the air- something about it is more wrong than anything else in the rest of this desecrated castle.

He takes a step into the room, and when nothing happens, another. The marble is smooth and hard, alien to feet familiar with gravel and wood and rough-hewn stone.

Did he feel this way before? Was the him of before comfortable here, in this too-large hall with it's gold and red and marble?

The sun is setting, and as it shines through the center of the triforce above the throne, he hears something.

It's a muffled sound, a soft sound, like a pillow falling to the floor.

By the time he looked up, he barely manages to comprehend the roiling mass of malice before it hits him.

And now

He's burning. He's burning. HE'S BURNING.

And suddenly he's waking up, eyes snapping open, (when did he shut them?) and all he can see around him is green, green, green, dripping wet in the morning dew.

It takes far too long for the rest of his senses to kick in,, for his breath to stop coming in short, shallow gasps, for his heartbeat to stop drowning everything out.

The sun is just lightening the horizon, casting it's blue early-morning tones over the hills and bathing everything in it's soft in-betweenness. Birdsong rends the air, familiar in it's steady throb, and if he listens closely enough he could pick out individual calls, wrens and starlings and sparrows among them, pigeons with their soft coos and even the bark of a crow passing overhead.

The earth is so soft beneath him, still steady, and if he thinks, vaguely, that if he curls his toes deep enough he can root himself, like the grass and the trees and the dessicated, long-dead guardians, just a part of the landscape.

For a second, a brief second, he smells something like burnt meat, like fire and smoke and burning, and he thinks he wants to scream. But then the smell of grass and dirt and Wet Things wraps its arms around him, and he sinks into it, breathes it in and breathes into it.

He, too, is wet with morning dew, fresh and cold and shockingly clean. Lifting a hand, he watches a drop slide down his finger until it beads at his fingertips, and falls to his tunic, dissolving into the fabric.

He takes a deep breath, tasting the coolness in his throat, and shuts his eyes.

Must have been a nightmare.

He gets up when the sun is high in the sky, after a long, long time of sleep but not-sleep, of utter black fading to dark grey to black again.

The dew has long since dried, it's freshness gone with it, leaving him parched in the summer heat. And once he realises thirst, hunger follows. It gnaws at him, chokes him, and before he realizes it he's rummaging through his bag, shaving everything he can find into his mouth.

He returns to reason with half an apple down his throat, stem and all.

He's in a small divot in the ground, just lower than the nearby terrain, and some part of him finds it familiar- hadn't he seen this before? He knows he'd been here recently- three days ago?

Three days before…

He smells the burnt meat again, like a wisp of smoke on the breeze, there but not quite, and just like he does around the ruins that make him start to hear things, to see things, to feel things, he stops thinking and moves.

He doesn't rest until the horizon is painted pink and orange and gold, until his legs begin to give out and he stumbles more than he walks.

He checks the Sheikah Slate, and unsurprisingly he's somewhere unknown, the map blank and dark.

He's somewhere East-Southeast of the castle, and judging that he woke up just outside the Great Hyrule Forest… he's gone even farther from Ganon.

In the distance, even further east than he is, he can see storm clouds, rain falling in a sheet over the mountains and whatever lies beyond them. A breeze carrying the scent of rain washes over him, rustling grass and leaves as it goes, and he breathes it in, holding it until his lungs burn.

The sun has almost set, pinks going purple and gold turning black. The stars are out, and the silver crescent of the moon is fading in, high in the sky. It will be a dark night tonight.

He stumbles off the path (too many monsters there at night, waiting for stupid travelers) and into the woods. Trees are the best place to rest for the night- high in their branches, he remains unseen.

It takes a while to find one that can hold his weight- this is a young forest, all saplings throwing new leaves up to the sun, too small to hold his weight, too thin to hide him in their foliage.

It's a grand old oak, short and squat but positively ancient, all rough bark and knobs where limbs had been cut off.

How old was it when he went into the tomb? Was it even alive?

He decides not to think about it, and instead nestles himself into the most comfortable place he can find, shifting and squirming until he fits just right.

All he has to do now is shut his eyes and let exhaustion do it's work.

Breathe in, one-two-three-four , breathe out one-two-three-four.

In one, two, three, four,

Out one, two, three, four,

In, one, two, three, four

Out, one, two, three, four,

Something like smoke drifts to him on a breeze, rough but subtle, and his nose faintly burns.

But it's too late to care, because the night has been patient, but it waits no more.

By morning the eastern rain has reached him. Just before sunrise, he's woken by drops of water running off the leaves above him.

It's a somber, quiet rain, nothing in it, as if the foxes and birds are curled away in their dens and nests, mourning. Fog blankets the forest, and he trips three times before making it back to the road.

In the distance, a Sheikah tower glows orange through the mist.

Maybe he'll go look?

The region he's in is called Lanayru. It's a land of seemingly eternal rain, always coming down in great sheets that keep him from seeing more than five feet in front of him.

It's always cold, too cold, and the rain has long since soaked through his light tunic, through his muscles and flesh and all the way down through his bones. The wind isn't bad, but even the slightest breeze makes his teeth clench and goosebumps break out across his chest. It is, in a word, miserable.

He couldn't have been wetter if he'd swam.

And going by the state of the path, swimming would have been the easier option. He isn't quite sure where it goes. Stretching out before him, it leads into the mountains, and whatever lies beyond. Like a trail of stars, a constellation, torches dot the path, glowing gold through the rain.

He's lucky he had food packed, neatly-wrapped rice balls from Kakariko. They send steam swirling through the air when he pulls them from the Sheikah Slate. They may be the only reason he hasn't frozen yet, besides the warm cloak Paya had given to him before he left. She'd wrapped around his shoulders just before he'd walked out the gates. It's made of a strange Sheikah cloth, soft to the touch, smooth and so tightly woven human hands could never have made it.

By the second day, his rice balls have run out. The chill he felt the first day has faded down to the occasional shudder. He still feels the cold, long seeped into his bones, but it's somehow softer, quieter.

There was a cooking pot along the road, and he threw just about everything he had into it. Spent two hours huddled in the rain, poking at soggy, half-cooked fruit.

What a miserable picture he must have made- wet hair, shivering, fire near gone out.

In the end, he's warm, he has food, and that's what matters.

Maybe the rain will end soon.

The bridges are nothing like anything he's seen before. Alien and strange, made of a too-smooth stone, his feet make a strange sound as he walks across it. Not a tap but a clack, not an echo but a noise that rings harsh then is swallowed. The stone is different: rougher than marble, less glossy, not as sleek, not as clean.

And there are lights, blue lights in the dark.

There's something there in his head- something strong, like his mind is trying to tell him something, but can't quite do it. Scrabbling at the walls of his skull, searching for something long lost and forgotten.

What was it?

He stands there, looking into the water roiling beneath the bridge. His reflection is impossible to discern beyond a vague shadow. The only light comes frm those lights, the blue lights.

He gives his mind a minute to search, to finish rooting through the boxes and shelves, and it finds nothing, nothing at all

The blue lights at the end of the bridge beckon to him. And he goes back out into the mud and dirt, and it feels like going back out into the rain as well- Like for a moment he had existed somewhere without it.

How strange.

The horizon is grey, just like everything else here.

Is the sun rising or setting?

He can't quite tell- the rain makes everything look the same.

One step into Zora's Domain, and he encounters the brightest person he's ever met. Sidon is kind and cheerful, everything a prince should be. His lighthearted, easy-going demeanour is exactly a necessity in this land of eternal rain.

Sidon is nice, but something about him, something-seems to send his mind rooting through itself again.

Empty bookshelves scoured through by clawed fingers, grabbing and scratching at nothing and everything.

He's glad when they part, and hates himself for it just a little bit.

On his way to the throne room strangers wave at him as if they already know him. Like a long-lost friend happy to see him again.

One Zora (who was he? He never introduced himself) hugged him first, teary-eyed. He looked confused when Link didn't hug him back-Heartbroken, when he searched his face and clearly didn't find what he was looking for. He turned away without a word, mouth grim, taut and shut.

No one else spoke to him after that.

Not until the throne room.

Vah Ruta is everything he feared, yet not.

Never did he expect something of such terrible power when Impa spoke of the divine beasts. He thought of a shrine, or a guardian stalker- But this thing, this great beast,is larger than Zora's domain itself. Larger than anything he's ever seen, larger than life.

How many Zora has it killed?

How many innocent have lost their lives to it, in it's senseless rampage?

It's insides are jammed with a black and red, oil-slick sheen. Thicker than tar, it coats every piston, every gear, however subtly. No matter where his eye lands there is a slight sheen, reflecting nothing but the brightest light.

It smells acrid, nearly-but-not-quite smoke, bitter and dense. It hangs, near tangible.

His head spins with it.

Malice. He knows it, he knows it too well. An odor that coats the back of his throat, so thick he can barely breathe. And it burns.

It burns!

Waterblight Ganon.

The definition of horror, the reason for the misery of these people, the corruption of a machine meant to save.

And yet, all he can think, as it appears out of water, out of snow and ice and rain, is:

Why is it called Waterblight when it clearly burns?

There's something familiar in it's red hair, in the way it looks, feels, smells. Something that makes him freeze up- not in fear, never fear.

When it lunges for him, there is something that makes his breath catch in his throat, something that makes his skin burn,something that freezes the blood in his veins, despite every fibre of his being telling him to move.

It's eye moves closer and closer, burning blue like a guardian's. Paralysing.

The spear is blue. So, so blue. Blue as the eye, bluer than ice.

Why is it so slow?

Still, it won't stop moving.

For a brief second it's agony- sharp, burning-but then he's colder than he's ever been in his life. But at least there is no fire, at least it doesn't burn.

Where's his cloak? The one Paya gave him, when he left? It was so warm-is it in the Sheikah Slate?

He reaches for it, at his left hip, but his arms won't move, can't move.

"Oh" he thinks, mind cloudy, vision darkening. The world slows to a stop. "I'm-"

He wakes up in the rain. The first thing he's conscious of is the water dripping off his eyelashes.

Then the sound- then taste, and then the smell- Like fish and mud, strong and tangible and fresh.

But last of all comes feeling. And it's cold. Cold cold cold. But he's been colder. He's been so much colder, that this pales in comparison.

So he swallows his shudders, pulls his cloak tighter, and walks on.

He's going… he's going somewhere. So he lets his feet guide him down the path, through the mud and puddles, through the dirt softened from days and weeks and months of rainfall.

Where is he going?

Zora's Domain.

The name comes to his mind unbidden, and settles there as if it belongs. He's going to Zora's Domain, of course.

He's going to help them with… with the creature causing the rain.

The Divine Beast, Vah Ruta.

The name brings to mind a monstrous being-rising, towering out of the water, arcs of electricity dancing about it, lightning harnessed from the sky.

It is horrible. Hylia, it is awful. It is death, it is a blight on the land.

It freezes, and it burns.

He shakes. It's the cold, clearly. Nothing else.

There's a blue light somewhere in the distance. A bridge marker.

He walks towards it, feet heavy.

This time, he's ready.

When it rises from the water, monstrous and powerful, he knows where to hit it with shock arrows, precisely where to aim to bring it to its knees.

He knows the puzzles, he knows the stench that coats the back of his throat more intimately than ever before.

He remembers it.

He doesn't always remember what happens when he dies, but it's been growing clearer recently.

And before he knows it, before he can comprehend it, Waterblight Ganon is before him, in all it's burning glory. It sweeps its spear out, ready to lunge, and he doesn't look it in the eye this time.

He knows what happens if he does.

He will not freeze up. He will fight, for the sake of the Zora. For the sake of Hyrule.

He will win, even if just to prove to himself that he can.

Mipha's ghost is so quiet. Even her voice is kind and soft when she confesses her devotion.

She looks so much like Sidon.

Maybe that was why his mind was screaming at him earlier. It's doing it again, rummaging through the empty boxes in his brain. Searching, to no avail.

She looks at him with such love in her eyes, even as she stands there a spirit, even as he looks at her with no recognition, even as she gives him her final gift.

Why is she smiling?

He feels himself dissolve away with the sensation of Sheikah teleportation. But he wants to stay here, with her. He wants to stay so much he feels his heart might burst from it, might explode from the pressure and questions and sadness of it all.

Why did she look at him so wistfully? What did he ever do to deserve a look of such utter devotion?

He wishes he knew who she was to him all those years ago.

It comes to him suddenly, in the middle of the night- there is the strange urge to get up, to move.

He leaves the place the Zora had prepared for him and wanders the grounds.

The moon is full tonight, but soft, muted. Faint wisps of clouds breaking in and out of existence as they cross it's surface, coming into being and leaving just as fast. The water is always there, but it is so much louder at night.

And with a thought, a shock like lightning, he looks to the sky again. The rain is gone.

It's so odd to see the sky without it- he'd forgotten, in some strange way, that it was even there in the first place. That the whole reason he'd embarked upon the quest to free Vah Ruta was the rain that made him cold and wet and miserable for days, the rain that froze and blinded him, that obscured the sky so much night and day were nigh indistinguishable. And now, it is gone.

There are less people out at night- less looks of guarded wariness, less sadness and fear.

His eyes find a statue on the lower level, near where the old stingray lurks. Tall and graceful, always looking down benevolently. Now he knows it's name.

Mipha.

It's empty eyes seem to call something out- the rattling of something shook loose, a shaking, a pain, and like a tidal wave, it hits.

The memory is so vivid he finds himself sitting on the floor. Smiling at no one and nothing when he wakes up.

Mipha… She had healed him whenever he needed it- and even when he didn't. She'd sworn it, that day on Vah Ruta. "No matter when, or how bad the wound, I will heal you" And even… even in death she'd fulfilled it.

And what had he done? How had he helped her?

He'd done nothing. Nothing beyond freeing her spirit, which was only trapped because of him in the first place. Because he couldn't do the one job he'd been born to do, Mipha had died.

And even then… Even then she'd still given him a gift, even then she'd still promised to heal him, to bring him back from the brink of death.

He can feel it, in his chest. Embedded there, strong and steady, it pulses in time with his heart. What's the use? What's the use of giving it to someone who's done nothing for her, even when she'd done everything for him?

His eyes sting, and he wipes them with the back of his hand. There's no use to feeling sad. No use mourning over someone long dead and only half-remembered. He stumbles a little as he stands, swaying in place, exhausted.

The moon is beautiful tonight.

He looks to the statue, and looks up at it. The moonlight lands perfectly on its face, and he almost expects her to step down off her pedestal and greet him, smile at him, wave to him-

He's so tired.

He heads for Hyrule Castle first thing in the morning. The Zora, it seems, are early risers, so he's sent off with by small crowd. So many different gazes follow him as he leaves— he feels them prickling at his back, caught somewhere between gratefulness and sadness, between broken-hearted and happy.

The castle looks the same as always, the same as it's looked since he woke up. Swirling black, malice-ridden, a veritable nest of evil.

But he has the sword, he has the armor Mipha made for him, he has her trident-and why her father ever gave it up, he doesn't know— he's more ready than he's ever been. And with the help of Vah Ruta, victory is assured.

Perhaps it was his victory over the waterblight that inspired this, the victory over not only the creature but the fear of something that has, essentially, killed him twice before that brings him to stand in front of those doors again. He is more confident than last time, but stronger as well.

He knows it's trick- at least the first one.

When he pushes the door open, he waits this time. And watches as its form falls, watches it splatter the walls, watches a monster birthed from its cocoon take its first breath.

Scorching eyes fix on him and burn with some unquenchable agony, some terrible rage and he readies himself for what is to come.

He takes a deep breath—and the smell, like burning, like smoke and ruin and the death of all things hits him. He stumbles, eyes watering, But. He can't stop now, can't just leave, can't run away.

So he braces himself. And as he's about to run in to fight for his life against this creature, he hears a voice.

It's faint, but sounds so familiar.

A searing beam of light illuminates the room, and a wretched shrieking echoes, reverberating around the room, from the walls to the floors and ceilings, attacking him from all angles, so loud that when it stops it still keeps ringing and ringing and ringing.

When the creature reappears it spews a flood of black blood, as though cut with a thousand knives.

The smell is weaker, and his legs move without his volition closer and closer, to those eyes, to the burning. His grip feels weak, hands shaking, but still the blade strikes true.

He swings again and again, hitting nothing, then something, then nothing.

Until, in a moment of terrifying clarity, it pins him.

He only comes to with the lack of motion, the lack of sound, the silence in the absence of the spider legs click-clacking around the room, the adrenaline freezing in his veins.

The beast leans in close and breathes its hot breath on his face.

He feels himself burn in it- feels his skin blister and pop and blister over and over again, sees the furnace in its throat until his eyes melt out, until he can't taste the blood in his mouth-

And he screams and screams and screams until his hearing stops (he's probably screaming still)- and then, blissfully the smell is gone, and it's only feeling that remains, only feeling until his nerves sear away so he can't feel at all.

And then what?

He wakes to the sound of a waterfall.

It's cold. (But that's better than burning.)

Anything is better than burning.

He doesn't want to open his eyes.

He can still feel them melting down his cheeks. Lava on his skin, boiling off in the heat, as he burns and Burns and-

The ground is hard and smooth on his shins. He stretches out his fingers, tentatively, and feels the dips between pieces of stone, soft time-worn cracks in the ground.

The night air smells clean- clean and sharp and cold.

And it sounds like waterfalls, like water flowing, and ever so faintly he can hear the sound of water lapping at a distant shore.

Somehow he finds it in himself to open his eyes to cold, softly glowing stone.

When he looks up, he's greeted by Mipha's visage- smiling, happy, benevolent and utterly torturous.

On shaky legs, he makes his way back to his bed under the pavilion.


End file.
